


Fate

by AlterEgon



Category: Le Pacte des Loups | Brotherhood of the Wolf (2001)
Genre: Gen, Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-23
Updated: 2013-12-23
Packaged: 2018-01-05 15:49:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,986
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1095800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlterEgon/pseuds/AlterEgon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first meeting between Mani and Grégoire de Fronsac, briefly after Fronsac's arrival in the New World.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fate

**Author's Note:**

  * For [alby_mangroves](https://archiveofourown.org/users/alby_mangroves/gifts).



> Dear Alby_Mangroves,
> 
> I hope you like this little story about Mani and his future blood brother.

  
  
Illustration by Rebekah

Mani slid through the trees silently, not stirring a leaf or making a sound that he did not intend to. He was part of the world around him, not shaping it to his liking but fitting himself into it so that he could easily slide from place to place, untraceable even to his own people.

Untraceable, certainly, to the prey he hunted right now – not to kill it, not to bring it down, but only to observe. Even if he had wanted to, there were far too many of them for that.

It didn't matter, however. He had no wish to harm them. He merely wanted to see the pale warriors who had arrived in their area and were busy setting up a village of their own, apparently determined to make a home here and stay.

He was not alone. The second, much smaller shadow gliding along beside him, as soundlessly and smoothly as he did, was his oldest son. He was still young, but already showing the promise of some of the gifts that Mani himself was endowed with. Not long now, and he would start teaching him the ways of the dreams, the world beyond the one they lived in.

He felt that his son would not have much time to learn. He would likely need the knowledge sooner than he should, for whatever reason. At first, Mani had thought that that knowledge heralded the end of his own life, suggesting that he did not have much time to impart his knowledge to his boy. However, nothing else seemed to support that particular interpretation.

Still, it was part of why he had decided to bring him along that day.

Which took him right back to his original problem. Ever since the pale-faced strangers had arrived, his dreams, his visions, had been more confusing than they should be.

With those visitors from afar had come dreams of a kind that he could not read easily. Dreams that hinted at change, of the worst and of the best sort alike, and that brought with them concepts that made no sense to him.

It was rare for Mani to be confused by the signs given to him, and so this day he had set out to lay his very physical eyes on the strangers. Maybe all he needed was to see for himself, to have a real memory to fit to the dream images.

That was the main reason he was going to take a look, in spite of his people's agreement to watch from afar for a while longer, to see what the strangers were going to do.

They had heard of them before, of course. Those strangers, or their brothers, were spreading across the land like a disease these days. It mught have been different if they had been willing to share, but they hardly were. They would not share the land, or the game, or, really, anything. They claimed for themselves whatever they laid eyes on. And yet, Mani was certain, they could not be all bad.

So although the general consent was, at this point, to stay away from them, he was doing the precise opposite, approaching them to have a closer look.

They were busy, so immersed in their work that they saw nothing else.

Oh, they had posted guards, but those, too, were so immersed in their work that they saw nothing, making it easy for Mani to get past them.

He smiled silently to himself. Even on his own, his son would have been able to avoid notice by these men easily. They did not know the land. They had not gone to the effort to get to know it. As a matter of fact, going by the clumsiness that they exhibited, he wondered if they had done any better back where they came from at all. They appeared to be missing even the most basic understanding of what to pay attention to.

Once inside the ring of liberally posted inattentive guards, Mani briefly hand-signalled their direction, and they turned as one.

He had spotted a man who was sitting away from the others all by himself, busily working on something.

In contrast to the others, he had the air of one who kept an eye on his surroundings in spite of his work, rather than being blind to them for all that he was supposed to be standing watch.

Sure enough – he did look up as they approached, although they were still sneaking up on him as silently as ever.

If anyone from their tribe had let him get so close before noticing his presence, he would have given them a proper scolding. In one of these strangers, it seemed to be unusually perceptive.

Mani froze, and felt, rather than saw, the boy beside him freeze as well. They held perfectly still, merging with the shadows of the trees, not causing any disturbance that would announce their presence.

He studied the man. He was tall – taller than Mani, from what he could guess with the other man sitting down. His hair was lighter than any he had ever seen before, though he had heard of the yellow and golden hair that some of the strangers sported. It was not, as far as he was informed, even a sign of age and wisdom – they were born with it and carried the lighter colour from youth, or at least from the age that they were considered fit to embark to a place that was not their own.

Like all of the strangers, the light-haired man wore layers of clothing.

Mani marvelled at that.

For some reason, the strangers went about dressed just as if it was the deepest winter, even when the winds were still pleasant rather than cutting and the leaves had hardly started to turn.

Those cumbersome clothes might have been part of the reason why they appeared so very clumsy. It couldn't be easy to move sensibly in a layer or two of leather over at least one layer of woven cloth. Truth to be told, that outer garment they seemed to like to don seemed to have no specific purpose at all and serve only to inhibit them – it was shaped roughly like a woman's winter dress, reaching down to their ankles, but cut open in the front.

That man was dressed no differently. His yellow hair covered byh one of their odd headdresses. Mani wondered if they were a sign of status within their war party.

He was reasonably certain that that was what they were, at least.

The man spoke, calling out words that Mani did not understand.

They remained where they were, while the man's eyes scanned his surroundings, trying and failing to find what they were looking for.

Eventually, he spoke again. "Come forward?" His voice was halting now, his tongue obviously struggling with the words – not in the dialect of Mani's people, but one close enough to be understandable.

Intriguing, indeed.

He had heard of people learning the newcomers' language, but not vice versa.

His weapon remained in easy reach by his side, but he kept his hands open as he decided to move forward and see what the encounter would bring. After all, he intended no harm to the man, and he had no reason to appear as if he did.

The light-haired man inclined his head with a smile as they separated from the shadows and stepped into the open.

"Greetings," he said – or probably so. In any case, it sounded close enough, and Mani decided that close enough was all he needed.

He issued a greeting of his own, standing at what he hoped was an unthreatening distance.

The other man spoke again, tapping his chest to support his somewhat garbled words with a gesture, making his meaning clear even if he ended up unintelligible.

"I am called Grégoire de Fronsac."

Mani almost raised his eyebrows in surprise at the lengthy name, though he assumed that it might have some meaning in the man's own language that remained obscure to him at this time.

He repeated the man's gesture.

"Mani," he introduced himself. "And here is my son." He spoke slowly, carefully enunciating his words in the hope that the man would understand them.

Each of them received a renewed nod from the man, who made no move towards his weapons or, even, to get up from his seat.

As he returned his gaze to Mani, the two men's eyes met, and a jolt ran through the Iroquois as a sudden surge of premonition and _knowing_ filled him. Somehow, for some reason and in some way that was as unfathomable to him just yet as the other man's very language, that instant filled him with the knowledge that their fates, his and that man's, were intertwined.

More still, they were tangled, and before long where one went, the other would follow.

That certainly was something that he would need to think on in a lot more detail, though right then and there it took all that he had not to turn and flee the place, the strangeness that he apparently was supposed to embrace, share and make his.

"I know but little of your language," the stranger – who was not supposed to be a stranger – said. The sentence came out more fluently, as if he had practiced it many times over to make sure it would be understood.

He reached out, but not for anything that might be used to attack or to defend himself with, but for the things he had been working with until just a few moments ago.

Mani watched as he continued his work, eventually tearing out the top sheet and holding it out to them.

Stepping forward, he took it, since that seemed to be what the other man was hoping for.

He looked at the gift, seeing himself and his son, outlined in quick strokes of coal, drawn simply as compared to the image of a plant that he could glimpse half-finished on the next sheet but nevertheless clearly recognisable.

Not knowing if this gift had any deeper meaning to the man, or if any specific reaction on his side was expected, he once again inclined his head in acknowledgement and watched the man - Grégoire de Fronsac, he would do well to remember the name – to see if there was any hint of dissatisfaction about his demeanour.

There did not seem to be, and Mani did not think that a smile to those people meant anything other than it did to his own.

Slowly, he pulled a narrow band strung with claws and fangs of the wolf he was named for over his head and held it out to Grégoire de Fronsac. It seemed a fitting gift for one destined to be his brother, though he still could not imagine by what strange twist of fate that was supposed to come about.

The light-haired man took the offering from Mani's hand, folded it up once, apart again, and then slipped it over his own head, letting the claws rest on skin under his clothing.

"We meet again, maybe," Grégoire de Fronsac said as he bowed slightly to them.

Mani nodded. "Soon," he said.

The magic of the moment broken as suddenly as it had appeared, he turned away from Grégoire de Fronsac. The boy beside him turned in time with him. His attention had never strayed, just as it should. Oh yes, he was ready for some deeper instruction.

Instruction that would have to be fast and intensive now, especially if, for some reason, some higher power intended Mani to follow this stranger. He could, of course, hope that Grégoire de Fronsac would, instead, end up following him, but somehow that felt wrong.

There was no point in trying to fight fate, and fate had apparently already made its decision.


End file.
